Her Perilous Wolf by Julie Steimle (free e books to read .txt) 📖

that the rest of the team had gotten into place by then, as she was not sure how long she could keep this up. “It was for me too.”

He gaze raked over her as she said that, critical and reading her—or trying to. He continued with his polite smiling façade as he gestured toward a room. “Would you come this way? We have much to discuss.”

Audry hesitated. “Actually, I am not here to make any deals yet. Grandpa wanted me to merely take a peek. The fact is, I had no idea he had business connections in Kenya.”

Mr. Wang grinned wider, but it was more of a crocodile grin. He could read something was up. “Well, actually, we usually deal in China. I was equally surprised to hear a Bruchenhaus was with us in Kenya.”

She smiled politely at him, wishing they were out of there. Akachi was standing close to her, which meant he could feel the threat.

But then Mr. Wang did something peculiar. He sniffed her. Then he sniffed her again and angled his head to the side. The man murmured, “What is that musk you are wearing?”

Audry shrugged, knowing she did not put on any perfume at all. “Nothing. Um, deodorant?”

He shook his head. “I know that smell.”

Shrugging again, Audry turned to Akachi, trying to restrain her nerves. “What do you think? Should we go into the warehouse or come back later?”

Akachi opened his mouth to say—but a loud noise erupted from beyond a pair of doors near the end of the hall. There were shouts, things banging like loud firecrackers, and screams. Someone burst through the door, calling out to Mr. Wang. He was bleeding in the shoulder.

Audry pulled back, aghast. She had told Juma not to shoot anyone.

Mr. Wang rounded on Audry. But before he could grab her, Akachi pulled out his pistol and pointed it at the Chinese man’s forehead.

“Hands up. This is an arrest.”

Mr. Wang’s face contorted into loathing at Audry who was still staring at the bleeding Kenyan employee. 

“He’s not dead,” Akachi said to her.

Audry nodded.

“You’re working with them?” Mr. Wang, nearly spat at her.

She did not reply.

“Now move, to the warehouse,” Akachi ordered.

Mr. Wang turned with hands up. But then, as if lightning, the man grabbed Akachi’s gun, shoving it up and away with a strength that seemed inhuman. He then grabbed at her, seizing Audry’s throat with a hand meatier than she recalled.

Reaching into her pocket, Audry pulled out her tazer and zapped him.

Mr. Wang Ruyi collapsed to the ground.

Akachi huffed, kicking at the knocked out Chinese man with a look to Audry. “You could have done that in the first place, Audry, and saved us some time.”

She laughed nervously, tucking her tazer back into her pocket.

 

The rest of the raid was a cinch. With the help of the local police, the warehouse was entirely surrounded and the occupants arrested. Most of the workers there were Kenyans, but there were at least four men from Mainland China out of the group. The truly hard part was taking in all the stacks of ivory tusks and cheetah skins—which they intended to incinerate so no one would benefit from them. It was a fortune-worth for smugglers.

Audry took photos of everything.

There was not one live animal, though. It was all things sold as part of a black market for Chinese traditional medicine or vanity.

As the police took away passports and IDs from the smugglers and poachers, they identified the four Chinese men: Wang Ruyi, Lin Guang Tao, Wang Shan Shan, and Wang Xiao Sen. She hated to say it, but at first glance, with them all in identical suits and ties, they all looked the same to her. There was nothing very interesting about their faces, nothing characteristic to hang on to. Unlike Rick’s friend Chen, who was memorable with bright thinking eyes and a wiser grin, these men just seemed like clichés. Cookie cutter, almost.  Luis spoke to them in his best Mandarin, letting them know exactly how much trouble they were in.

Wang Ruyi was clearly the boss. As they were lined up while sitting on the floor where the police were watching them, he was calling the shots. They all peeked to him. He mostly told them to keep quiet.

“Jabari, keep an eye out for amazimu,” Juma said, leaning near her in a whisper. “You have good sight, and I trust your judgement to the ends of the earth.”

Nodding, Audry noticed Mercy sticking close to Juma, the woman’s eyes now averted from her as is she did not exist at all. It was preferential to the dirty looks. It was especially preferential when Juma was still flirting with her.

“I will guard her,” Hezzy declared, Mixie and Brutus following him as if to say the same thing. 

Wang Ruyi’s eyes followed her, tracking her savagely as if she had personally betrayed him. Darth stuck with Audry, always between them and growling at the men. It left an unsettling feeling in her gut. The dogs did not seem to be upset with anyone except Wang Ruyi, actually.

But considering Juma’s request, she tries to see if any of these men had mouths on their backs or necks, or animal heads on the backs of their heads—even the Chinese men. But they all appeared normal. In fact, none of them except Wang Ruyi gave her the kind of shivers that she felt when near people like Tom Brown, Silvia, or those like Daisy’s wolf pack. It occurred to her, she had been among those connected to the supernatural since the day she had rescued Rick.

Wang Ruyi sniffed her again when she got near. He drew in a deep loathing breath, then exhaled. His eyes seemed poisonous as he stared at her. “You…”

“Oh, come on…” Mercy said finally in a sarcastic voice. “Like she can see amazimu. The Amazing Audry Bruchenhaus does not have magic vision. Come on Juma. These are just men. Have them arrested already. We’ve got the evidence. Let’s go.”

Juma shook his head at her, opening his mouth to answer.

“You really are a Bruchenhaus,” Wang Ruyi snarled. “Are you here on orders of your grandfather?”

Several of the men perked up. One in her group mouthed ‘who?’

Audry shook her head. “He doesn’t know I’m here.”

“Who is your grandfather?” Hezzy asked.

Juma also looked interested. Audry had never really told them about her extended relatives—only her immediate family. Seeing his looks, she sighed. But she said to Hezzy, “My grandfather is an extremely wealthy businessman. But I never would have expected him to do business with poachers. He has some ethics.”

“Some ethics?” Dennis looked likely to laugh, catching her tone.

She nodded to him. “My father left that. He preferred to be a healer—a chiropractor specifically.”

But Wang Ruyi scowled at her. “You still smell of him—and someone else. I know that smell. I know it.”

“Smell?” Hezzy inched between Audry and Wang Ruyi. Hezzy nodded to Juma.

Their crew gathered close. This had to be an amazimu.

Juma pushed Wang Ruyi back and checked behind his neck. No mouths. No heads. He looked about as human as human could be. They exchanged looks. Something was wrong.

Until a notion struck Audry. He was Chinese. That could mean he was still supernatural, but migrated from China, like Chen. So she asked, “Do you know Bai Nian Chen?”

Wang Ruyi’s eyes immediately widened. He leaned back in horror from her. “How do you know that name?”

Audry barely peeked at Juma and the others when she said, “I met him this summer. A friend introduced us.”

Wang Ruyi swore under his breath in Mandarin. He snarled at her, “Your friend the wolf? That’s what I smell! I smell that wolf on you!”

“What wolf?” she blanched, peeking once to Juma whose eyes widened. Those in her original group stared. They knew whom he was talking about. Her wolf.

“Líng Xūzi,” Wang Ruyi snarled more.

“Was that the name of that other Chinese-faced guy?” Sefu whispered to Luis.

Luis shook his head. “Different name.”

“The red wolf,” Wang Ruyi growled out, his voice increasingly more gravelly. Yet everyone knew that wolf who had been the poacher had black fur. But Audry knew once more he meant Rick.

However one of the other Chinese men stared him, shaking his head as if his boss was losing it “Líng Xūzi was a gray wolf who pretended to be a Taoist from Journey to the West.” Explaining it more to the English speakers.

That story? Again? Audry puzzled. Was that a coincidence? Or not?

Wang Ruyi shot his subordinate an extremely dirty look. “Lin Guang Tao! Ānjìng! Líng Xūzi shì hóng láng. Tā shì Sūnwùkōng de péngyŏu.”

“Bùshì,” one of them snapped back, leaning away from him. “Nĭ shă le ma? Nĭ bùshì << Xīyóu jì >> zhōng de Wang Ruyi. Nĭ zhĭshì wŏmen de lăobăn.”

Luis glanced to Audry, looking confused. He understood what was being said, but he clearly did not get it.

Hezzy shot his gun into the air, shutting them up. “No ching-chong talk. We are taking you to the authorities.”

“I will not go!” Wang Ruyi snapped, baring rather frightful teeth. They were narrow, all sharp like fat needles. He may not have been an amazimu, but he was definitely not human.  

Hezzy pointed his weapon at him, somehow not seeing it. “You go with us, or we shoot you now.”

Wang Ruyi went pale. Nodding, he peeked at Audry, rising as if to obey. For a moment, at least to her view, his eyes appeared to glow red. But the next snatch of a second he whipped about as if he were a spring unwinding—yet instead of unwinding, he coiled down into his clothes until they looked empty.

Everyone jumped back in horror. The dogs barked at the clothes.

They all lurched back in fright again when a great snake slithered out the pant leg, leaping straight for Audry. Her hand automatically went up to protect her face. The snake latched onto her wrist, unable to get her throat where it had been aiming.

“Ife!” Juma sprang to her as she fell back, swatting off the snake who left puncture wounds in the top and bottom of her hand—the marks looking strikingly poisonous. She knew the difference. The pattern in the teeth.

Hezzy shot after the snake, trying not to hit Darth who chased after it. Yet the snake whipped quickly away into the pile of ivory, out of reach from bullets or jaws.

“Douse it with petrol,” Juma shouted, holding Audry as she bled, the skin around the wound swelling. “Set it on fire! We’re going to burn it anyway!”

Someone shrieked for a bite kit. Someone else shouted for water and a knife. Soon one ran up with bottled water, dousing the wound. No one had a bite kit, though someone did dig out Audry’s animal rescue kit, which at least gave them rubbing alcohol and iodine.

“Are we going to burn down the warehouse?” Sefu snapped over the din of the dogs barking.  

Dennis turned toward the police to see if they could do that. The policemen were nodding, horrified that such a great snake was in there—never mind that it used to be a man a minute ago.

The world around Audry felt to be spinning now. Most of the police were rounding up the poachers and taking them out while Sefu and Hezzy used the dogs to search around for the great snake, Wang Ruyi. But Juma, he lifted Audry off the ground, carrying her quickly to the nearest jeep with Dennis to get to the closest hospital. Mercy came along, dabbing Audry’s forehead with a cloth she hardly felt.

Audry glanced down at the bite. Around the major fang holes, there was already some blue and green discoloration. Oddly, the pain was like submersing her hand into ice cold water. It numbed and burned. The frigid burning washed up her arm to her shoulder, then oddly spread into her chest, up her neck and over her head like a dousing of cold water. Her body started to shake. Yet… she felt something else. Stripped. Exposed. And she heard a peculiar crack. Looking